1. Technical Field
This application relates to a method and an apparatus for the monitoring of an automatic container handling and treatment station such as a bottling, capping and labeling machine, for the correct and essentially error-free handling and treatment of the containers such as bottles, cans and similar items to be processed.
2. Background Information
The large number and variety of machines that are classified as container handling and treatment plants are frequently unable to guarantee a continuous and uninterrupted flow of containers from one part of the machine to another on account of what are generally only minor disruptions or malfunctions of individual machines. For this reason, various attempts and developments have been made in an attempt to achieve an optimal regulation of the equipment. However, these adjustments and adaptations require significant effort and expense in terms of the electronic and mechanical equipment involved which, under the severe operating conditions found in container handling and bottling plants is not always sufficient or cannot withstand these harsh conditions.
For example, in one method of the prior art, for the determination of the capacity and the number of containers that can be accommodated in handling and treatment machines that process containers in the form of kegs, such as cleaning machines, for example, the output capacity is continuously determined mathematically based on the number of containers input, the treatment time and the capacity, as well as on the current fill level of the machine, and the factor that is determined in this manner is used to regulate the capacity of the machine itself and/or the capacity of additional associated machines (German Patent No. A1 31 20 603).
With this method of the prior art, especially for the cleaning of entire plants, disruptions that are caused by the handling machines that store kegs are detected and can be used to influence associated machines. In this case it is further possible to influence the container handling and treatment machine in question in terms of its operation. In the case of a problem on the input side, after the passage of the hold time, which is a function of the throughput capacity, the problem has an effect on the output capacity of the machine and causes a difference in this capacity, for example by means of a tachogenerator or an output capacity that can theoretically be determined in another manner. To this extent, with the method of the prior art, the output capacity can be determined from the number of kegs input and stored and from the current filling level. The resulting data can be used to regulate the output or for the general regulation of this treatment and handling machine and/or in the context of the overall plant.
German Patent No. 41 37 319 C2 also describes a method for the monitoring of a labeling machine with which the number of objects entering the machine, the temperature and the quantity of the adhesive used in the same period of time, are monitored, from those values a quotient that characterizes a specific adhesive consumption and the temperature of the adhesive can be regulated to set the specific adhesive consumption. For monitoring of the labeling machine, a sensor is provided to detect the number of incoming objects, with a measurement device for the continuous determination of the quantity of adhesive consumed in the same interval of time, a temperature sensor, an evaluation device and finally a tempering device. In both the methods of the prior art, for the determination of a theoretical throughput, the number of incoming containers is referenced and used as a basis for the calculations.